A coaching legend's no-how

BY Jason Kelly '95

John Gagliardi left his office door open while he studied game film, an unheard of security breach compared to the paranoid lockdown of most college football programs. It’s true that Gagliardi, the head coach at Division III Saint John’s University in Collegeville, Minnesota, for 60 years until his retirement last Monday, Nov. 19, operated outside the scope of the sport’s most intense surveillance. Still.

Nobody has ever won more games. An accomplishment like that usually attracts copycats, but Gagliardi, 86, never had to worry about protecting his intellectual property. If any coaches sniffed around his office looking for insight or inspiration, none of them ever put his methods to use.